Self Paced Gaussian Contextual Reinforcement Learning

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Ardakani, Mohsen Sahraei, Song, Rui
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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author Ardakani, Mohsen Sahraei
Song, Rui
author_facet Ardakani, Mohsen Sahraei
Song, Rui
contents Curriculum learning improves reinforcement learning (RL) efficiency by sequencing tasks from simple to complex. However, many self-paced curriculum methods rely on computationally expensive inner-loop optimizations, limiting their scalability in high-dimensional context spaces. In this paper, we propose Self-Paced Gaussian Curriculum Learning (SPGL), a novel approach that avoids costly numerical procedures by leveraging a closed-form update rule for Gaussian context distributions. SPGL maintains the sample efficiency and adaptability of traditional self-paced methods while substantially reducing computational overhead. We provide theoretical guarantees on convergence and validate our method across several contextual RL benchmarks, including the Point Mass, Lunar Lander, and Ball Catching environments. Experimental results show that SPGL matches or outperforms existing curriculum methods, especially in hidden context scenarios, and achieves more stable context distribution convergence. Our method offers a scalable, principled alternative for curriculum generation in challenging continuous and partially observable domains.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2603_23755
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Self Paced Gaussian Contextual Reinforcement Learning
Ardakani, Mohsen Sahraei
Song, Rui
Machine Learning
Artificial Intelligence
Curriculum learning improves reinforcement learning (RL) efficiency by sequencing tasks from simple to complex. However, many self-paced curriculum methods rely on computationally expensive inner-loop optimizations, limiting their scalability in high-dimensional context spaces. In this paper, we propose Self-Paced Gaussian Curriculum Learning (SPGL), a novel approach that avoids costly numerical procedures by leveraging a closed-form update rule for Gaussian context distributions. SPGL maintains the sample efficiency and adaptability of traditional self-paced methods while substantially reducing computational overhead. We provide theoretical guarantees on convergence and validate our method across several contextual RL benchmarks, including the Point Mass, Lunar Lander, and Ball Catching environments. Experimental results show that SPGL matches or outperforms existing curriculum methods, especially in hidden context scenarios, and achieves more stable context distribution convergence. Our method offers a scalable, principled alternative for curriculum generation in challenging continuous and partially observable domains.
title Self Paced Gaussian Contextual Reinforcement Learning
topic Machine Learning
Artificial Intelligence
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.23755